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Kazakhstan will tighten rules against bride kidnapping, in which women are kidnapped and forced into marriage, a lawmaker told AFP on Thursday.

Despite some progress on women’s rights, the practice criticized by human rights groups is on the rise in the Central Asian country, officials say.

“Unfortunately, cases of bride kidnappings are increasing,” lawmaker Murat Abenov said in an interview with AFP.

He submitted a draft law to combat the phenomenon to parliament on Wednesday and secured the support of parliament speaker Yerlan Koshanov.

Koshanov, a ruling party lawmaker, called bride kidnapping a “growing disease” and “one of the most burning problems” in Kazakh society, local media reported.

Abenov told AFP that “few cases are brought to court” because the existing legal framework “does not provide for an adequate and effective response to bride kidnappings.”

Kazakh authorities admit that there are no reliable statistics on how common bride kidnappings are.

There have been 18 cases in the South Turkestan region this year, Abenov said.

The issue of women’s rights gained widespread attention in Kazakhstan last year when a former MP murdered his wife.

The case shocked Kazakh society and prompted President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to enact several laws to strengthen protections for women.

Earlier this year, Tokayev said some people “hide behind so-called traditions and want to enforce the practice of bride kidnapping” – he said this was “unjustifiable”.

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